New College in Va. Seeks To Cater to Home Schoolers

Plans for a new institution of higher education in Virginia little
resemble the traditional college or university. And that's just how the
organizers want it.

The two-year postsecondary school would be the nation's first to
cater directly to home-schooled students, according to officials at the
Home School Legal Defense Association. Students would split their time
evenly between classroom work and internships.

A foundation affiliated with the Purcellville, Va.-based group
recently paid about $400,000 for 29 acres of vacant land there, with
the hopes of opening the school to about 25 students in 1999. The group
aims eventually to serve as many as 300 students.

The organizers say such a school would offer a needed alternative
for home-schooled students.

"Home schoolers approach the education of their children differently
than a lot of people," said Michael P. Farris, the president and
founder of the Home School Legal Defense Association. "They give their
children much of the content of what's in a classic liberal arts
college education at the high school level."

The school will be nondenominational, but will have a Christian
orientation and likely will reflect a conservative ideology, said Mr.
Farris. The lawyer and ordained Baptist minister is an influential
figure among conservative Republicans in Virginia.

A Policy Focus

The planned school's emphasis on apprenticeships is modeled, in
part, on the practice in some European countries of giving students
on-the-job training instead of a regular academic program, Mr. Farris
said. But the concept also has historical roots in the United
States.

"It's partly influenced by the fact that the Founding Fathers in
this country were by and large apprenticed," Mr. Farris said. "Very few
were educated in the kind of institutions we see today."

Instead of surveying and blacksmithing, however, the first programs
offered in the new school would be in public-policy areas such as
government, politics, and journalism.

Some of the seven staff lawyers at the Home School Legal Defense
Association, a national group that represents families whose home
schooling has put them at odds with public school officials and
government regulations, may act as adjunct faculty members, Mr. Farris
said.

"Home schoolers have had to fight a very recent battle for their
freedom," said Mr. Farris, adding that for some students this has led
to an interest in public policy.

Mr. Farris himself ran unsuccessfully as the GOP candidate for
lieutenant governor of Virginia in 1993.

The school's proximity to Washington also opens up opportunities for
internships in government and the media, he said.

A Narrow Niche

Despite the school's conservative leanings, its purpose is not
political but to respond to the needs and interests of the growing
number of students who are home schooled, Mr. Farris said.

The population of home-schooled students in the United States now
totals as many as 1.2 million, according to the National Home Education
Research Institute, a Salem, Ore.-based group that studies the movement
and acts as an information clearinghouse for parents interested in
teaching their children at home.

A recent survey by the institute suggested that home-schooled
students are about as likely to seek postsecondary education as are
graduates of public schools. There is scant research on their
performance once in college, but some recent studies suggest that
students who are home schooled tend to outperform public school
students on standardized tests. ("Home-Schooled Pupils Outscore
Counterparts," March 19, 1997.)

A higher education program based on apprenticeships could be
attractive to many of the parents of these students, said Brian Ray,
who heads the institute. Some of those who opt to home school believe
the traditional postsecondary school isolates their children too much
from the adult world.

"I think it's a response to the idea that academia is maybe too
cerebral, too theoretical," he said.

While agreeing that the new school's concept fills a niche, however,
others doubted it would appeal to most home school parents.

"Most parents who home school their kids still want them to be able
to live in the world and go out and get a degree that's marketable,"
said David Merkowitz, a spokesman for the Washington-based American
Council on Education, which represents some 1,600 higher education
institutions.

Jon's Homeschool Resource
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